Best friend revealing your secret

[whiteflag]

Hi, please excuse this long post of mine but I don't know who else to turn to. I am hoping some of you, any of you, can help me. I really need some perspective on something that has just thrown me off balance.

I'm a guy and my closest friend is a guy, we are old college friends. I confided in him 3 years ago about a medical condition I have (MS). The same time I met a friend of his (a girl) who I really liked, and she and I became good friends and have remained good friends ever since.
My friend and this girl started dating a while back and broke it off, yet she and I have remained friends.

I found out recently that my friend told her about my medical condition the same time I told him about it (3 yrs ago), which is also the same time I met her. When I asked him how he could go and do something like that, that it was something told to him in CONFIDENCE, he said it just slipped out, and apologized to me. This has really thrown me off balance and I don't know how to deal with this, and it is really affecting me that he breached my confidence on something so sensitive. To add to that, that this is one of the first things she got to know about me. And although we are still good friends today, I can't help but think that our friendship started on the footing of this knowledge.

I asked her once whether she thought we could one day date, and she jokingly said 'in the next life, not this one'. I had no knowledge then that knew about my condition. Today I understand why she said that.

Does anyone have any perspective on this? I am a very private person, I don't talk about my medicals to anyone (except a very few friends know about the MS). He is not a friend I'd like to lose but now I am having trust issues and it's causing me a lot of anxiety.

The biggest thing going through my mind is he revealed what I told him in confidence. That, and the fact that he knew I liked her, he liked her too (common knowledge to all his friends), and I am feeling that he made sure that nothing could happen between her and me, so he told her about me.

Thanks, any advice or opinion would be appreciated.

 

[rasselas]

...

Rule of Thumb.

Only ever share secrets with mute, illiterate, antisocial cave-dwelling hermits.

Otherwise, this happens:

you tell person A your secret. they promise not to tell anyone.

person A has one significant other who they confide in, Person B. Person B promises not to tell the secret which Person A promised not to share. Person B then confides in their significant other, Person C. Person C is now detached enough from you that, if they judge the information to be of significant gossip value, they'll pass it on, usually off the cuff, so that the information will eventually be shared by Person A-Z.

However, each time the information is shared it can be distorted. So the likelihood of everyone having an accurate copy of the secret you confided in Person A is remote.

This happens. We are social creatures. And the game of love can be very competitive, as you've found.

Keep your cards close to your chest. Size up your rivals. And don't get too sentimental about the ones that slip away...

 

[SimonB]

Sound advice!

 

[Ainsworth]

different people have different values, so the things we hold dear like keeping a confidence may not be on their list of whats 'as' important to them.

they could also share that type of regard with another person the same way you did with them. secrets always have a habit of becoming known but when that happens that shows more about the person who told then the person being spoke about.

you are also adding motive to his intent to destroy something between you and this girl. we can always think things are done in a negative light because we feel betrayed by someone so close.

so you need to weigh up, did he do it to manipulate a situation or did he repeat it out of concern?

it can be very difficult to trust when things like this happen, especially if the action is repeated over again with different people. you say you dont want to lose the friendship, so you still hold this person in high regard. i think its ok to be upset with him and to tell him you are, that is a natural response. you just need to step back and think about all of it as a big picture and not in sections. and yes it will be hard to do

goodluck

 

[bubbling under]

I can kind of see both sides here.

Something similar happened to me many years ago, where I confided in my best friend about something which was going on with me. However, what I hadn't figured in to the equation was what effect me telling her this had had on her. She had also 'confided' in someone else, and we fell out about it. So, yes I can totally see where you're coming from. But, at the time, and hindsight is a wonderful thing isn't it, she needed another person to 'prop' her up and use as a sounding board so that she could in turn fully support me. As it happens, we are still friends.....best friends

I hope this all turns out well for you

 

[dib4uk]

hey everyone.

Good advice all round. I dont know if I can add to this or not.

Just that for me, telling someone something important should be kept a secret, but, like Markuk said that person tells someone else, who tells someone else in confidence etc and before you're aware more people know than dont.

I hope it doesnt affect your friendship with your friend, but, just rememeber that we all do something at times that we later regret. Saying that, if I was you i'd be more gaurded around that friend again, but thats just me.